This is my very first article ever, and could be my last…..I have tried to be as none judgmental as possible, but here goes
There has been much speculation over the last few days and I personally think the writing is on the wall, as they say, “Rumors only come about to prepare us for the outcome”
Red Bull is an Austrian owned business, its high level drink was created in 1987 and was the inspiration to improve performance of high extreme sports, since then the company has gone onto purchasing many sports business’s which have had significant impact in their sports areas, the most notable one being Formula 1, however it has increased its branding in most sports, all of its sports teams have to include the Red Bull name due to its branding status. Another notable item that includes the brand name is the sport home or venue, for example Red Bull Leipzig FC plays at its home stadium Red Bull Arena, and New York Red Bulls home is also Red Bull Arena. If you focus on Football alone it has four current teams in leagues in Austria, Germany, Ghana, and Brazil, all at top level within the designated country.
It would benefit the brand greatly if it gained a premiership team or a championship team which would graduate to the premiership in a short spell
I have tried to get some financial reports on the business but because it’s a privately owned business it does not have to declare its P&L, saying this it has 40% of the drinks market and sold around 5 billion cans in 2012. (That alone is a lot of money)
With all of its branding products it does have a very attractive portfolio when it comes to injecting finances into its projects, 2.2 billion on Formula 1 in 2012.
So I guess the outstanding question is as Villa fans and a product of our own for 140 years, would we accept a dramatic change in Colours, Team Name, and Ground Name, and a New Club Strategy.
Now before any of you go off on one, this site has bemoaned continually for Lerner, Faulkner, and Lamberts head over the past 2 months, some for the past 3 years, so at what price are you prepared to go to, so you are happy with the club? Remember change is always inevitable in our ever demanding society but at what cost is it acceptable.
One more thing to think about no other business has been linked with Villa except Red Bull.

Like this:

119 Comments

andrew are you serious? 50m to displace one of man city/arsenal/utd, liverpool chelsea. spurs or everton?
which players at what price have you identified that we could buy for 50m that would make us as good or better than one of those teams?

if if was honestly that simple it would be done already.
totenham would not have to have spent 100m last summer to sit in 6th currently.

for a team to compete for league position against the above
it would take hundreds of millions.. and even then you are not even guaranteed 8th never mind 4th

the alternative is Evertons route which in my opinion is the long game based on continuity ..
that means sticking with a manager for the long term

its something Aston villa and Aston Villa fans are not particularly well known for.

To crack the top 4 we need at least one possibly 2 world class players. Look at utd they have Rooney and Rvp and the only reason they are struggling is because they have been missing long periods. City have tourre, aguedo negrado and kompany, Liverpool have Suarez Gerrard, poss Sturbridge and courtinho, arsenal have mezil and giroud , Chelsea Terry, Torres, Oscar mata etc plus a top manager. We have Grant holt, kae and ashley fuckin Westwood ffs! Not only would we have to sign 2 world class players we would need to build a quality team around them and then hang on to them long enough to get into CL. That is £200-250m at least if you include wages.

Except in no way did I say we’d reach Chelsea or City with 50m. However United’s not just missing RVP or Rooney, they have a terrible midfield, their wingers have all been garbage and their defense is a mess. The only thing good about United is that their GK, Rooney and Rafael. And that they’re United.

Liverpool’s defense isn’t good enough, LB, RB, CB whatever. They’ve dropped Gerrard deeper which has ruined their true creativity and Coutinho’s not been as affective so what do they have? Henderson and Suarez doing it all up front.

We don’t have to sign 2 world class players to fight for a top 4. Look at Everton, Newcastle, Spurs, and Liverpool who only has 1. They don’t have world class players, but they have great squads and the one thing we don’t have, a talented manager. Give a talented manager 50m to upgrade our midfield from garbage to class, which means about 4 10m midfielders and then bring in a Left Back and with Benteke and Kozak, Vlaar and Baker/Clark/Okore, Guzan, and Bacuna wherever he’s played… That’s not in any way worse than Pool, Spurs, Everton, Newcastle or United.

They also had Fergie, Carrick was so much better than this season, and they were straight up dominating teams. That affect went completely away when he left, and Fergie left Moyes pretty much in the shit and set to fail, but Fergie knew it was his last chance to win something so he signed RVP for himself instead of setting up the next manager in far better standings.

Agree and tbf if you take Rvp out that side last year they were a pretty ordinary team. Moyes us a patsy to take the club down for a season or so then they can go for a guardiola etc to get them back up as they won’t have the pressure moyes has had.

Something else has changed. I have seen a few decisions go against Man U recently. Have the referees lost the fear of upsetting Fergie? They would never admit to it but he did exert influence and Moyes just doesn’t have that. About time too IMHO.

So true ever since the ref let them play till they scored 2 goals which psychologically ended our title hope they have had all big decisions go their way. Fergie and utd are cheats IMO no wonder they win so much with refs giving them all the big decisions especially when they were losing. If refs go against utd at OT then fergie would make sure they never refer there again for a big game. Basically he had a huge influence in who should ref which is why Webb got so many games there. They deserve for some decisions to go against them it’s long overdue

Alright, 50m might have been a bit of a stretch. 20 points would be a hell of a lot to make up. But you also have to remember, Benteke was injured/wasn’t firing, we’ve had defensive injuries all season including having to play Lowton and Herd as CB’s, not a single midfielder of ours is good enough for even a top 10 bar Bacuna and maybe Sylla if played correctly.

But we have a solid foundation of that of what Newcastle, Liverpool and Everton have. We have a close enough to world class striker… Benteke. Not quite Suarez but as good as Lukaku and Remy. We have a good enough back up in Kozak. Not quite Sturridge but better than Kone and Cisse. Vlaar would start at any of those clubs, maybe bar Everton. Okore would be a future starter at any of them as well. Guzan’s just as good as Mignolet, Howard and Krul. Our problem has and will always be in midfield. We used to have a quality midfield and now it’s so bad, however still we’re 11th with the worst midfield in the EPL. Think about it… 4 10m midfielder’s and a new LB and maybe a back up LB/RB. Then what do we get?

Guzan

Lowton – Vlaar – Baker/Clark/Okore – Class LB

Class DM-Class CM

Weimann – Class AM – Gabby

Benteke

Now tell me… With 4 new starting signings, with back up like Sylla, Delph, Kozak, Bacuna, Helenius, the kids… Is that any worse than what Newcastle, Liverpool or Everton have? No…

Now I didn’t add Spurs because they’re special. They have a world class CB in the making in Chiriches, but they have an incredible midfield without the quality up front and their fullbacks aren’t good enough either. Their midfield and CB’s are good enough to keep their scorelines incredibly low that they can win 1-0, 2-0, 2-1 games. Playing a 4-2-3-1 and with players good enough in midfield which we have 1 in Bacuna who could even start over Weimann, we’d be better than Southampton and be up there with Everton, Liverpool, Spurs and Newcastle and even United. Will we become as good as Arsenal, Chelsea and City? Of course not, we’d need new owners for that one. Oh and all of this revolves around a far better manager, one closer to the talent of Rodgers, Pardew or Martinez, not one closer to Accrington Stanley.

Don’t forget our so called world class striker will be of soon anyway. Which takes me back to what I said earlier on the rare occasions we get a decent player can we keep them long enough to build a CL squad. Answer to that is a massive no for all sorts of reasons.

“Our world class striker will be off soon”? Just like you predicted he’d go last summer? Then you said he’d be gone in this transfer window? What’s your next prediction, that he’ll be gone next summer? If you predict he’ll be gone in every window eventually you’ll get it right.

The issue with the Prem is that it is killing football really.. there will be a bust come one time..

You have about 10 clubs playing to stay up.. a couple mid table.. then there are probably 6 trying to get into CL.. look at Liverpool.. haver been very good this year and yet could still finish 5th and end up with nothing..

Now if Villa ( for arguments sake ) get brought by a mega rich owner.. we would still have to compete with Man City Chelsea and there riches.. Man U and Arsenal.. two traditional top four clubs.. then you have Liverpool and Spurs.. up there too…

Now 7 into 4 does not go lads.. something has to give..

Any one buying the club will have to pay around 200M and probably need to pump in 500M ( IMO ) in fees and wages over the coming seasons to sustain it..

Even then there is NO guarantee of a top four finish with all the other elite clubs..

There is NO point at all in buying the club and investing to finish 6th/7th.. yes good for us fans to see better players and football BUT for an owner what good is it..

So yes there is talk of a takeover but unless it is a MEGA MEGA rich owner i can’t see why someone would by us at the moment..

Wtf? You say the mirror article is rubbish then totally contradict yourself and then space bar81 jumps on the band wagon contradicting every other post he’s/ she’s/it’s ever posted. DOL was right – fickle.

The article summed it up for me without going to over the top with a one sided opinion.

A lot of rumours about a potential take over not all of them saying Red Bull, we now have a consortium, i will believe it when i see it. A few people on twitter last night were saying Southampton is a better fit for a Red Bull takeover.